On one hand, Kalimullah Masheerul Hassan wanted the defamation suits against Rocky and Jeff Ooi delayed as long as it takes. The net effect is to gag and silence the two Big-Mouth Bloggers from further blowing his cover.

More so, when he now schemes to use ECM-Libra Avenue to be in cahoot with Tony Fernades for the airline FAX. This, Kalimullah is doing after he has successfully used law to gag Matthias Chang and Husam Musa from exposing his scheme in taking over Khazanah-owned Avenue Capital on the cheap, and slip back in ECM-Libra when the heat cools off.

On the other hand, Cecil Abraham has been ousted from Shearn Delamore, taking with him the son, and Riswant Singh, the LA wrote the claims documents that the bloggers labelled as FATALLY DEFICIENT and EMBARRASSING to the Bench and Bar.

It’s a limbo for Shearn Delamore, but its a boon for Kalimullah. Both thus continue to share the same strange bed. Delay as long as it takes.

On May 28, the case against Rocky was dragged for it to be heard by the Registrar of the High Court, and then the Judge should the the decision be challenged by either party, which is more than likely if you understand how defamation suits work.

Hence, Rocky’s case will be heard some time in August 2007.

Similarly, on June 19, Shearn Delamore took the same line of argument for Jeff Ooi’s case, citing plaintiff’s instruction, and wanted the hearing to be conducted by the Registrar some time in September.

Kalimullah wants delaying tactics in the meandering process. He didn’t bother to contest if Rocky has provided further evidence to pin Brenden Pereira as a serial plagiarist. Just delay as long it takes. After all, all the legal cost is borne by the shareholders of NSTP, and Shearn Delamore’s pricetag has nosedived so tremendously if NSTP Chairman’s words are to be taken as an indication.

And Shearn Demalore is unsure if its wants Cecil Abraham take away the Rocky and Jeff Ooi files, or keep it at home.

Meanwhile, Jeff Ooi is gagged with the ex-parte injunction to expose further on Kalimullah.

After all, if Kalimullah’s former boss, the dead Tan Sri Loy of the dead MBf Group, managed to to gag lawyer Wee Choo Keong with an ex-parte for 14 long years, why can’t Kalimullah who isn’t dead, yet?

That’s the reason why we didn’t have much to report in this website since April.

This is what we wrote about three months ago, asking you not to trust us then, but we assured you “time will be the better judge for truth”.

Cecil Abraham, 59, who is lead counsel for NSTP et.al. (in the defamation suits against bloggers Rocky and Jeff Ooi), has recently resigned from Shearn Delamore after his proposal to merge the legal firm with another medium-size law firm was rejected by the junior partners.

Cecil has a brother, Wilfred, as a senior partner in Zul Rafique & Partners. Rumour is rife that Cecil may take the NSTP defamation cases against bloggers to his new law firm, along with his son Sunil and legal assistant Rishwant Singh.

Datuk Abraham, who is widely regarded as one of the country’s top litigation lawyers, caused a stir in Kuala Lumpur’s clubby legal fraternity when he resigned from Shearn Delamore three months ago as a result of differences with his other partners over the firm’s direction.

His break with the firm that he had been attached to for over three decades prompted speculation that his departure could presage more resignations from the law practice and the loss of several large clients.

According to lawyers close to the situation, Shearn Delamore has not suffered any haemorrhage in business or personnel since Datuk Abraham, 60, submitted his resignation.

According to several senior lawyers, Datuk Abraham (who leaves the firm at the end of July) is expected to join Zul Rafique and Partners.

Isn’t it about time Cecil Abraham looked at his expiry date as a money-earner lawyer, the byname for legal vultures? Only fools like Kalimullah will get him fight the bloggers on the Internet-related case!

How wishful too, if Cecil had thought that by currying flavour with Kalimullah could help him land more government-related work!

If you read Leslie Lopez, who quoted several senior lawyers, after joining Zul Rafique and Partners, Cecil Abraham could violate a ‘restraint of trade’ clause in the partnership agreement with Shearn Delamore, which restricts him from practising within the Kuala Lumpur geographical area for two years.

And NSTP’s suits against Rocky and Jeff Ooi are being heard in the Kuala Lumpur High Court!(more…)

Cecil Abraham, the beyond-expiry-date lawyer who still thinks he is a Godsend to Malaysian legal practice, has replaced the Irish as the butt of jokes for lawyers who drink across the streets of Shearn Delamore’s drinking hole.

His copy-and-paste LA has now given him a copy-and-paste headache, big headache.

You see, Rishwant Singh, the legal assistant (LA) who enjoys being praised as a meticulous hawk for his research and case preparation, must have been consumed totally by the accolades. He did a copy-and-paste for two sets of Statements of Claims against bloggers Rocky and Jeff Ooi, respectively. The first set was dismissed by the defense counsel as FATALLY DEFICIENT.

Shearn Delamore, for all the salt it’s worth, could have just stuck to their gun and shifted no commas nor periods.

No, the Singh re-worked and filed an amended Statement of Claims against the two bloggers. Again, COPY-AND-PASTE! See our blogs of 02/03 and 25/02.

The next moment, Cecil A. is deservedly reduced to his usual theatrics as being a Big Bully, famous in-court and infamous off-court. You must see how sullied his face was when he didn’t get what he wanted in Court when Judge Hishamuddin passed down his decision on April 2 in Rocky’s case!

Put it this way, the Singh has cleverly offered Defense counsels the best ground for Jeff to merge the two cases, while Shearn could still continue to bill The NSTP and its shareholders for the wonderful “services” delivered!

Kalimullah wouldn’t mind because it’s not his money he is burning away. Would he?

WHAT WOULD PROBABLY HAPPEN NEXT?

Be that as it may, all that would have been a normalcy in the Court had it not been Rocky’s case that had moved full-steam ahead!

Rocky has withdrawn his striking out application, and he appeared ready to go full swing with his case, with the hearing proper starting on June 28. Our contacts in Malaysia said Rocky is drawn up his list of witnesses, and another list for subpoena. His written submissions are almost ready, too.

ANALYSIS. As early as February 25, we told you that NSTP’s defamation suits against bloggers Rocky and Jeff Ooi had actually exposed Kalimullah’s evil agenda.

Kalimullah is actually using NSTP’s financial resources, and muscling up reluctant companions in Balai Berita, to enable him pursue his personal vendetta against the two bloggers.

More, Kalimullah has many things to hide from the Umno grassroots and intelligentsia who are now so Internet-savvy.

The truth lies in the two original Statements of Claims (which were tacitly released to this journalist-blogger), and subsequently the amended Statements of Claims (which were deliberately leaked to WALK WITH US).

The two sets of claims were authored and filed on Kalimullah’s behalf by M/S Shearn Delamore.

Don’t forget, to avoid a TKO (technical knockout), Kalimullah and Gang were compelled to amend their claims after the bloggers’ lawyers had called them FATALLY DEFICIENT.

Changes made they had on the Statements of Claims, but Kalimullah remains conceited that the 48 articles directly pertaining to him – which contained known facts he hadn’t denied – must be removed from Rocky’s blog, and 15 articles removed from Jeff’s Screenshots.

Last week, Shearn Delamore just added one more article that Jeff has to remove, making it a totally of 16 articles, by way of the ex-parte injunction it obtained from the high court on January 11.

Why must the 64 articles be removed when the court has not touched merits of the case?

Why must the 64 articles be removed when the court has not touched merits of the case? That’s also the same question Malaysiakini had asked in January, commenting on the defamation suits.

The answer is, it’s to muzzle public access to information.

What are those 48 + 16 articles that Kalimullah is so afraid of? The answer is contained in the supporting affidavits attached to the claims, and amended claims, that Shearn Delamore crafted for Kalimullah and Gang.

Of Rocky’s 48 articles, 26 are related to Kalimullah misadventures abusing his power in The NSTP, of which at least three articles are cross-linked to expose in Jeff’s Screenshots.

Of Jeff’s 16 articles, 14 are related to Kalimullah’s misadventures abusing his power in The NSTP, of which at least 9 articles are cross-linked to expose in Rocky’s Bru.

The expose in the blogs are supported by public domain information, and probably some traders’ insider accounts, about Kalimullah’s activities in subverting national interests, and destablizing the political equilibrium in Malaysia by selling-off the country’s interests to Singapore.

The information is believed to contain details related to the ECM-Libra/Avenue Capital deals, and the orchestrated scheme to demonize Mahathir which ultimately blew up in Kalimullah’s Sunday column that is filled with distorted facts and published in the NST of June 11, 2006.

Kalimullah, to date, had not denied any of the his misadventures reported in Bernama, the mainstream and online media, especially those contained in the Khairy Chronicles in Malaysia-Today.

It is understood that these will be among the highlights to be deliberated when the actual hearings take place in the open court.(more…)

People in The NST overheard that Kalimullah Hassan has a shopping list. Urgent shopping list.

MUST DO #1: Kalimullah is considering re-hiring Rehman Rashid for a new task, not as a night editor serving the graveyard shift, but to be a hired-gun to shoot-and destroy bloggers in Malaysia.

Sources said Rehman, who has earlier left NST to join, and now left Al-Jazeera, is likely to up the up the job. His first article to whack bloggers is likely to appear as early as next week.

MUST DO #2: Kalimullah wanted Shearn Delamore to take Rocky’s case away from Justice Hishammuddin Yunus, and to consolidate it under the same judge who is in charge of Jeff’s case, namely Justice Abdul Malik Ishak.

Sources said Kalimullah is not too comfortable with Judge Hishamuddin for being too liberal with the underdogs.

Kalimullah, who told people he wanted to use the court to promote “responsible blogging”, is the second plaintiff in both Rocky and Jeff’s defamation suits.

NSTP Group Editor-in-Chief Hishamuddin Aun and CEO Syed Feisal have confided to their close friends that they had no choice but to toe Kali’s demand and command.

April 24 is now the new date fixed for blogger Jeff Ooi’s defamation suit to be mentioned before High Court judge Abdul Malik Ishak.

Today, March 6, is supposed to be the day for Jeff’s applications to strike out the case, and to set aside the ex-parte injunction to be mentioned.

However, on February 15 (three days before the Chinese New Year), plaintiffs’ lawyers Shearn Delamore served an amended Statement of Claims on Jeff.

In chambers today, lawyers from sides have mutually agreed to take another date pending further decisions on whether Jeff’s lawyers will proceed with the applications to strike out of the suit, and to set aside the ex-parte injunction.